John, who will close out Bonnaroo 2014 with a Sunday-night show, has performed in Nashville several times over the last few years. But the Bonnaroo appearance will be his first — and it marks his first-ever U.S. music festival show. It comes a year after another knighted Brit, the prestigious Sir Paul McCartney, headlined the four-day festival.

Tis officially the season for year-end best-of lists, and folks at alternative music hub SPIN have just shared their picks for the "50 Best Albums of 2013," which includes efforts from four Nashville-based artists.

Music City places as high as No. 17 with mainstream country newcomer Kacey Musgraves' major label debut "Same Trailer Different Park." Indie-country favorite Caitlin Rose comes in at No. 25 with her sophomore effort, "The Stand-In," and a third twenty-something country songsmith - Ashley Monroe - follows with "Like a Rose" at 35. Acclaimed instrumental guitarist William Tyler lands at No. 42 with his "Impossible Truth."

Topping SPIN's list this year is divisive hip-hop star Kanye West, whose "Yeezus" album even includes a Nashville connection - via a brief, sampled appearance by country/rock and roll great Brenda Lee.

Kanye West continued to vent at former partner Nike, taking to the mic during a concert again this week to complain about his treatment by the sports apparel company.

West spent more than 6 minutes talking and singing about the company during his "The Yeezus Tour" stop Wednesday night at the Bridgestone arena in Nashville, Tenn. Taking on the role of a preacher in the cult of personality, West talked to the crowd about following a dream, creativity and culture, alluding to the media and corporations who he feels have tried to keep him from expressing himself fully.

The 36-year-old rapper then started to leave the stage, but in a feint returned to launch into a long discussion that was alternately esoteric, comic and emotional.

"Do you know who the head of Nike is?" West asked the crowd as he prowled back on forth on an arrowhead-shaped stage in a white mask. "No, well let me tell you who he is: His name is Mark Parker, and he just lost culture. Everyone at Nike, everyone at Nike, Mark Parker just let go of culture."

West has said in interviews recently that he's now partnering with Adidas. He first released his Air Yeezy shoe in 2009. He's chafed recently during interviews at being categorized as just a musician, and told the crowd he has the Internet and the stage from which he can speak directly to his fans.

"I'm talking directly to you. No miscommunication," West said. "Did you not want the Yeezys? Nike would make you believe it was my fault that you couldn't get them, but that was not the case. I wanted there to be as many Yeezys as there was LeBrons, and I wanted them to be at a good price, but that was not my choice, and we're going to change everything. And ... I'm going to create more than you think that any musician in the history of time ever could have."

West also put his displeasure into song to the delight of the crowd, noting with the help of Auto Tune and piano in the background that even though Nike wouldn't take his call, other forward-thinking companies will.

"I talked to the head of Disney today," West sang. "And I talked to the head of Louis Vuitton today. I swear to God on my life, I talked to them both today. I swear to God I talked to them both, and they wished me a Happy Thanksgiving. I said, 'I want to talk about something that isn't turkey day. I want to talk about something different. I want to talk about dreaming.'"

With less than a week to go until Thanksgiving, it’s one of the busiest travel times of the year. As tons of holiday revelers make their way through Music City in the next week, so will more than a few music stars: rockers, rappers and country artists who are among the biggest names in their genres.

Nashville’s largest regular concert venue — Bridgestone Arena — is hosting four supersized concerts leading up to Thanksgiving Day, topping a list of musical offerings that includes several holiday concerts, club standouts and a honky-tonk block party on Lower Broad. Continue reading →

RS says Pistol Annies' sophomore album is "full of attitude and guffaws," praises the "catchy, biting lyrics" of Kacey Musgraves' "Same Trailer, Different Park," and argues Annies member Ashley Monroe's solo album "Like a Rose" is "even better" than her famous trio's debut.

Believe it or not, someone other than Kanye West gets the last word on the outspoken rapper's new album, "Yeezus" - and it's Nashville's own "Little Miss Dynamite," Brenda Lee.

A bit of spoken word from the beginning of Lee's 1959 hit "Sweet Nothin's" - in which the singer says "Uh-uh, honey" and "all right" - is sampled and used throughout "Bound 2," the final song on West's new album.

Speaking to the Tennessean on Monday, Lee said she hadn't heard West's song, but had received several calls in the last week since the album's June 18 release.

"My goodness," she said, after learning how prominently her voice was featured. "It’s nice to be recognized."

Lee's unlikely appearance on "Yeezus" came as "a bit of a surprise" to the Country Music (and Rock and Roll) Hall of Famer. She says she wasn't contacted by West's camp, as label MCA Nashville has the rights to approve the recording's use. But she deems it a good surprise, especially as West's fans are now turning to clips of "Sweet Nothin's" on YouTube.

Kanye West (AP Photo/Evan Agostini)

"It's always nice to know that somebody has remembered you and knows your work," she says.

One year after "Sweet Nothin's," Lee topped the pop chart with one of her signature hits, "I'm Sorry." This week, she'll likely top the charts again, as "Yeezus" is projected to debut at No. 1 when sales figures are released on Wednesday - a notion that strikes Lee as "pretty surreal."

"That says a lot about the songwriters here in Nashville," she says. "They write wonderful songs that withstand the test of time. That song is over 50 years old. You never know, you know?"

Opinions are like...... they are, like, really plentiful, and I’m glad for that. I get paid for mine, which is a pretty sweet deal. And your uncomplicated opinion about a complicated political situation was no reason for radio programmers to remove your wonderful music from country radio stations.

Plenty of other performers - Merle Haggard, Bruce Springsteen, Kanye West, Toby Keith, Johnny Cash, Woody Guthrie, Beyonce Knowles, etc. - have offered political opinions without corporations banning their music. And it’s unfortunate and disappointing that only a handful of country artists - Vince Gill, Merle Haggard and Garth Brooks among them - defended you and your place in country music after your comments. Every country music artist and record label should have been petitioning corporate radio outfits Cox, Cumulus and Clear Channel to play the Dixie Chicks music, in the name of free speech and deft musicianship.

You were a victim of knee-jerk ridiculousness.

Ten years later, you are a perpetrator of knee-jerk ridiculousness, as highlighted in a new “Rolling Stone” article teased on the front cover as “Natalie Maines Declares War On Nashville.”

Can’t we just let our knees rest for a while?

I get that you were hurt and wronged by everything that went down a decade ago. And I’m not advocating that anyone stay away from your new solo album, “Mother,” because of the comments you’ve made about Music City music. I have enjoyed listening to “Mother.”

The Dixie Chicks perform at the Bi-Lo Center on May 1, 2003, in Greenville, S.C., on the opening night of their tour of the United States. "We have a plan for this," lead singer Natalie Maines said after the band's first set. "If you're here to boo, we welcome that. We're going to give you 15 seconds to do that." And when Maines counted to three, the sold-out crowd erupted in cheers and the Chicks broke into "Long Time Gone." (Photo: Tennessean file - AP Photo/WireImage, Rick Diamond, HO)

The Chicks had sued their record company, Sony, claiming they hadn’t been properly compensated for all those albums sold, and they’d settled that lawsuit out of court. They’d gone to Texas and made an excellent, accomplished, acoustic-based, bluegrass-informed album, produced by Maines’ steel guitar-playing father, Lloyd Maines.

The album, called “Home,” sounded nothing like anything else being played on country radio, but the Chicks were powerful enough that country stations felt like they had to play the music.

The first single on “Home,” released via the Chicks’ aptly named Sony imprint, Open Wide Records, was a jaunty acoustic number called “Long Time Gone” that included this rumination on how country radio had grown lousy: “Listen to the radio to hear what’s cookin’ but the music ain’t got no soul,” Maines sang.

A lead single that criticized the very stations that would be playing it? Yes, sure. Did they play it? Absolutely. Big hit.

They also played follow-up single “Landslide,” a contemplative version of an old Fleetwood Mac song. The third single was “Travelin’ Soldier,” a down-tempo lament set in the Vietnam War era, about a tragic love affair between a high school girl and a soldier. Radio, perhaps grudgingly, ate it up.

So the most popular act in country music was working outside the lines, skirting the system and winning at every turn. Then, on March 10, 2003, the Chicks played a show in London, at the same time U.S. troops were preparing to go to war in Iraq, hoping to avenge the 9/11 attacks and to find weapons of mass destruction.